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Copyright Office To Aereo: Quack All You Want, We Don’t Think You’re A Cable Service

(…) following the Supreme Court’s decision that said Aereo was a cable service solely because it looked like one, and therefore had to pay retransmission fees, we warned that this would lead to a legal mess. Some people insisted Aereo could just start paying retransmission fees, but we wondered how that would fit with the ruling in the ivi case, that said internet companies didn’t qualify for statutory licenses on retransmission fees, because internet companies are not cable companies.

Aereo made a filing with the court that basically said that given the Supreme Court’s “look like a duck” test finding it a cable service, it seemed pretty clear that the ivi ruling was overturned, and thus it now wants a statutory license to pay retransmission fees. In addition to telling the court this, Aereo also filed with the Copyright Office its application to be eligible for those fees, leading the Copyright Office to send back a somewhat passive aggressive letter saying that it will “accept” the letter “on a provisional basis” but refuses to “process” it because, in its opinion, the ivi ruling means Aereo cannot be a cable company and nothing about the Supreme Court calling Aereo a cable company changes its opinion of that fact.